


...Or Not At All

by NervousAsexual



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series
Genre: Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Major Illness, blood cw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 09:51:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11666718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NervousAsexual/pseuds/NervousAsexual
Summary: He understands intellectually that nothing lasts forever, but Spock still isn't quite ready to let go.





	...Or Not At All

**Author's Note:**

> Twice now I've been in this situation, where a loved one was sick and could have pursued treatment but was ready to be done and left anyway. The first time it happened was five or six years ago and the last time was only two years ago, and even though they're both long gone I'm still not ready to let go. I'm not sure if it helped to write this or not.

"Spock?" Leonard asks, his voice hoarse, but before Spock can respond the doctor crumples into his arms.

He hums a single strong note to calm himself and lifts Leonard easily. "Jim, I will take him to the medbay. If you can handle things here?"

"What?" Jim is trying and failing to hide his fear. "Oh, yes. Of course."

He carries the doctor quickly to the turbolift and finds himself rather relieved that no one joins him. As the turbolift begins to move he looks down at Leonard. There is a flutter in his throat as he swallows. His eyes are open slightly.

"Leonard," he says. "I am taking you to the medbay."

Leonard shakes his head.

"We will be there momentarily."

Leonard tries to raise his head but instead flinches in pain. His entire body spasms and Spock can barely manage to hold him.

"Jus wanna go to bed," Leonard says, his speech slurred. "Shpent too much time there anyway."

"I doubt that Dr. M'benga would feel the same."

Leonard paws at his chest and nearly falls as he struggles to get his feet on the ground. Spock allows him to stand but does not trust him to do so well. He hugs Leonard tightly against his chest.

Leonard's head sinks down against him.

"Jus wanna sleep," he mumbles.

"Hush."

There is a warm damp spot growing on his chest. He looks down, expecting tears, but it is blood, pouring from Leonard's nose.

"You're bleeding, Leonard."

Leonard clutches at him and he can feel the fear radiating from him. Then a flood--fear, shame, need, a hundred feelings he hasn't names for.

"Jus take me home," Leonard pleads, so softly, as the blood bubbles across his lips. Spock wipes at the blood, trying to clear a spot for Leonard to breathe. He feels a tremor run through him and the doctor grows heavier.

Again he lifts the doctor in his arms and waits for the doors to open. He will not take Leonard to his quarters and he will not stop now, no matter how deeply betrayed Leonard will feel. He hums the one long note to calm his thoughts but there is a whine, high and weak, at the back of his mind.

He carries Leonard to the medical bay and lays him on the first biobed he can reach and shouts--tries to restrain his voice but shouts--for M'benga. He must still be feeling the effects of Leonard's fear because all he feels inside is turmoil and anxiety. 

M'benga comes out of the lab and sees them and he shouts for a nurse and runs to them.

"How long?" he demands.

"I brought him directly here."

"How long has he been unconscious?"

"Not long. Minutes, perhaps."

M'benga angles the biobed up and wipes away the blood on Leonard's face. He looks frightened.

"What can I do?" Spock asks him.

M'benga doesn't answer. He jabs a hypospray into Leonard's neck and Leonard flinches and gasps, his head jerking up off the bed.

"Easy," M'benga says gently. "Stay with me, please, Dr. McCoy."

Leonard cries. "Spock?"

"What can I do?" Spock demands again. "Dr. M'benga, would you please..."

"Spock, please, take me home."

"You can help me hold him." M'benga's voice is commanding when he speaks to Spock but when he turns back to Leonard his voice is soft again. "Dr. McCoy, we're going to get you through this. I just need you to stay awake for a bit longer."

As he takes Leonard by the shoulders and holds him down he tries to send calming thoughts into their meld but he isn't sure of himself.

M'benga loads another hypospray and puts it to Leonard's neck. "Dr. McCoy, this should make it hurt a little less but I'm going to need you to stay awake. I need you to talk to me or to Mr. Spock so I know how you're doing."

He squeezes two fingers against Leonard's arm but Leonard pulls his arm away.

"Wanted," Leonard gasps, "to go home."

"You know why I could not do that." He tries again to take Leonard's hand but McCoy tries to twist out of his reach and the only thing stopping him from slipping off the bed is M'benga.

"Don't want him," Leonard says. He won't look at Spock. He just stares up at M'benga with pain in his eyes.

"Spock," M'benga says, but he stands.

"I understand," Spock says. "Leonard? I will see you again, after."

Leonard doesn't look at him. Spock closes his eyes. Breathes deeply. Leaves the room.

* * *

He does not see Leonard again for several days, but he does not go to the medbay. When Leonard is ready to see him again he will send for him, he thinks.

Except Leonard doesn't send for him. One day passes, then the next, and the next. Jim goes to him several times and from his expression Spock knows that Leonard must be improving somewhat. From the way he talks Jim must not know that Spock has not visited the medbay. M'benga knows, and surely Chapel must as well, but they say nothing.

At last they meet again. Spock is returning to his quarters one evening and sees Scotty emerging from Leonard's quarters.

"Mr. Spock," Scotty says.

"Mr. Scott."

He watches the engineer duck into the turbolift at the end of the hall and wonders how much Leonard has told him. The two of them have always been close.

It will do them no good to stay apart and stew, Spock tells himself, and goes into Leonard's quarters.

He finds Leonard stretched out on a couch, the vast grey one that he calls a "davenport," holding an empty glass that may have held water but may have held a mint julep--Spock is still not clear on how to discern which. At first it does not appear that Leonard is awake, but he opens his eyes and looks at Spock with a blank expression.

"What do you want?" Leonard asks.

"You are looking well. I am glad."

"Get out of here."

"I understand that you are upset."

"You do, huh?" Leonard hefts himself up on his elbows and winces as his weight falls onto his back. "I don't think you do. I think you're thinking about this logically, like you do, thinking that I'm being unreasonable."

Spock would like to say he is wrong. He would like that very much. But he cannot.

"I asked you for one damn thing, Spock."

"I suspected you would feel this way but I also suspected you would understand my reasons."

Leonard lets the glass fall to the floor. It bounces but doesn't break. "Sure I understand. Why would I expect you to take me home, like I asked, when the medbay's just a skip and a jump away? Why would I expect you to understand *my* reasons?"

"Leonard..."

"Shut up." Leonard slouches back on the davenport. "Just shut up and go away."

There is a pain in his jaw and Spock is surprised to discover he has been clenching his teeth. He opens his hands flat before him--he has been clenching them as well.

He would like... what he would like is...

But it doesn't matter what he would like. He does as Leonard says, and as he is letting himself out he hears Leonard say something he was afraid to hear.

"I don't want to live like this," Leonard says, softly, to no one.

He pauses at the door with his hand still poised above the controls.

"Can you understand that? Shouldn't that be logical? When something isn't productive any more, you stop doing it."

How can he phrase it like that? How can he assign value to his own life like some kind of twenty-first century libertarian, like he is a machine and not a living breathing soul?

"If all that can keep me going is a hypospray... it's not worth it. It just isn't."

He watches his fingers curl against the wall. He remembers wiping away the blood on Leonard's lips.

"I would have thought you of all people would have understood."

"No." He turns back. He will not listen to this any more. He strides to the davenport--let Leonard look him in the eyes if he is going to say these things--and only barely stops himself at a respectful distance. "Do you want to know my logic, Leonard? Do you want me to explain it?"

Leonard glares back at him.

"This is my reasoning, Leonard." He raises his hand, to touch him, to attempt a meld, he isn't sure, but he stops himself and the hand is like a barrier between them. "I will not live without you, not if there is any way to help it. I won't. I can't."

The ice in Leonard's eyes softens but doesn't melt. "Well, you'd better get used to the idea, because it isn't your life."

He can feel himself wilting. He wants to explain but he doesn't understand how he can.

"I do not want you to feel your life has no value," he says. "Because that is not the case."

Leonard holds up his hands like he's trying to explain but he doesn't do anything with his either, only gestures in vain.

"That's not it," he says at last. "Spock, that isn't it. I've lived more years than I ever thought I was going to. And it's been... Come here."

Spock comes closer. Leonard gestures him in closer and closer until he is sitting at his side on the davenport and Leonard reaches up and holds his face in his hands.

"It's been better than I ever dreamed it could be," Leonard says softly. "But it can't last forever."

With both of his hands he holds Leonard's wrists and squeezes, sending his love on the only way he knows how. He's never felt more helpless.

"I don't want you to save me, Spock. I just want you to be there with me."

It isn't Leonard being illogical, Spock realizes sadly. It is Spock himself. "It is..." He finds he can't look into Leonard's eyes. "It's admirable, Leonard, how at peace you are with this."

Leonard looks at him as if he wants to argue but he doesn't know what to say. He looks... disappointed.

"I'm not," he says at last. His hands fall back, hanging limply in Spock's own. "God's sake, I'm really not. But I need you to respect my decision. And I dunno if I can trust you to do that."

Everything Leonard says makes sense under that thick layer of emotion. He can feel the pain himself, not just the now-familiar ache permeating Leonard's body but the betrayal, the bottomless disappointment at having to get up and face another day. Spock's chest is tight--he wants Leonard to be comfortable and happy, yes, but he can't deny that even so he still isn't ready for this to be over. He feels the tears stinging at his eyes and looks away.

"I'm not ready," he whispers.

"I jus wanna go home," Leonard says softly. His voice cracks as he speaks. "I don't wanna leave you. I jus want..."

"I understand," Spock says, but he isn't sure if he does or he doesn't. He feels like that little boy who was never quite Vulcan enough, tugging at his mother's sleeve and insisting it isn't fair. He hates that feeling.

"I love you," he says, because he knows Leonard prefers words. He hates the feeling of tears but when he looks into Leonard's eyes there are tears there too. "I'm sorry."

Leonard doesn't say it's okay, because he isn't, doesn't say all is forgiven, because it isn't. But he reaches up again with shaky hands and pulls Spock down to him and hugs him as tight as he can. And Spock... Spock hugs him back.


End file.
